It’s hard to win games when an offense is nonexistent.
On a night where Florida’s pitching rotation combined for 18 strikeouts, the Gators’ bats struggled at the plate for the majority of the game against Jacksonville’s pitchers.
The Gators scored four runs in the third inning and didn’t record another hit until the ninth inning.
“I don’t think we swung the bats very well tonight,” said head coach Kevin O’Sullivan. “There were some opportunities there to score some runs, and we didn’t do it.”
The No. 6 Florida Gators (12-8) were defeated by the Jacksonville Dolphins (8-12) 7-6 Tuesday night at Condron Family Ballpark. It was a frustrating night for Florida’s offense.
Gators junior right-hander Ryan Slater made his first start of the season and 11th appearance overall.
Slater’s role this year has primarily been to eat up middle innings when things go haywire for Florida’s starters. O’Sullivan has referred to him as arguably the most valuable arm in the pen and rarely hesitates to use him.
“Slater has been really successful here for a long time,” O’Sullivan said Feb. 28.
Slater never quite found his footing Tuesday, though.
He was taken out after giving up two runs in the first inning, which led to the Gators pivoting to numerous different arms throughout the middle innings. O’Sullivan said he wanted to limit him to 30 pitches. He finished the first with 27, which led to the switch.
By the fourth inning, Florida had already used four different relievers: Fisher Jameson, Robert Satin, Grayson Smith and Luke McNeillie.
This isn’t an uncommon practice for O’Sullivan during midweek games. Against Florida State on March 12, the Gators utilized eight different relievers. However, O’Sullivan was finally able to ease off of his bullpen usage when McNeillie got in a groove.
Coming off of his first career save on Sunday, the freshman right-hander’s success carried into his relief appearance Tuesday.
“It was definitely a big boost in confidence for myself knowing that he still had the trust for me in that moment,” McNeillie said.
The freshman entered the ninth against then-No. 4 Texas A&M and retired the side against one of the most lethal lineups in the nation.
There wasn’t nearly as much pressure Tuesday.
McNeillie entered the fourth inning with two outs and runners on second and third. Swiftly, the freshman struck out Dolphins third baseman Aiden Masters to end the inning.
McNeillie then struck out his next three batters and struck out two more in the sixth inning. He finished his night with six strikeouts in 2 1/3 innings pitched.
Freshman right-hander Alex Philpott followed and pitched just as well, tossing 2 1/3 scoreless innings. However, with the Gators trailing 5-4, Philpott was taken out in the ninth after surrendering two singles.
The pitching change that followed proved to be consequential.
Freshman left-hander Frank Menendez recorded just one out. He surrendered three singles, allowing two runs to score and provided enough cushion for Jacksonville redshirt freshman reliever Isaac Williams to finish the ninth.
Gators two-way player Jac Caglianone hit a solo home run in the ninth to shave Florida’s deficit to two. Three singles later, the Gators trailed by just one run. With the tying run on second and two outs, FAU transfer Armando Albert struck out looking to end the game.
The Gators will travel to Baton Rouge, Louisiana, for a matchup against the No. 5 Louisiana State Tigers (17-4, 1-2 SEC) at 8 p.m. Friday in a rematch of the 2023 College World Series Final. The series will be broadcast on SEC Network+.
Contact Luke Adragna at ladragna@alligator.org. Follow him on Twitter @lukeadrag.
Luke Adragna is a third-year journalism student and the Florida Gators football reporter at The Alligator. He is a cat ethusiast and completes the NYT Daily Mini in less than a minute each day.
